I'll never cruise again after this cruise. We were bored on the ship. The food was inedible. And the staff was disinterested. It was probably the worst vacation we have ever been on. My son was actually happy to be back to school after this trip - that's how bad it was!
Embarkation
3 out of 5
We paid for "Faster To The Fun," and the embarkation experience was fine. The people were pleasant and the lines were short. If we did not pay for the "Faster to the Fun" experience, it looked like it was going to be a very LONG wait.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
1 out of 5
We ate in the main dining room twice, and the food was terrible. We went to the main dining room another night, and the line was too long to wait on. We had had any time dining, and we were told the wait would be about 45 minutes long. The food at the buffet was inedible. We lived on cheeseburgers from Guy Fieri's stand, pizza, and ice cream. Other than those three items, the food was literally the worst food I've ever tasted.
Onboard Activities
1 out of 5
There were very little activities for kids, especially when the ship was in port. The shows were not appropriate for kids. The ship only played two movies and both of them started at 8 p.m., which was too late for kids. The pool was PACKED, and not enticing. It was incredibly boring. We spent most of the time sitting in our room reading and playing the ipad. We were so bored that we were counting down the hours for the cruise to end.
Entertainment
3 out of 5
The Rock N Roll show was okay, but not great. The rest of the performances were pretty lame, and all of them were not appropriate for children.
Children's Programs
1 out of 5
We checked it out, and my son had no interest in staying. It smelled like dirty diapers, and there were no kids playing. The staff did not try to engage my son at all.
Service and Staff
1 out of 5
Room steward only cleaned our room in the morning. We had to make the bed ourselves every evening. And he let us know that he would not be present on debarkation day, so that we could tip him in advance. Our sheets were never changed - just the bed got made. The bartenders were annoyed by our "bubbles' program - they didn't want to deal with serving soda. The service was not good.
Ship Quality
3 out of 5
The ship is older, and the decor is not attractive, but we saw plenty of people trying to keep things clean. The decks need more protection from the sun. It was too hot, and there was no shade. We used the waterslides alot. However, the mini golf smelled like sewage.
Cabin / Stateroom
1 out of 5
The bathrooms smelled like urine. The room did not have a single chair to sit in. It was very uncomfortable to sit (which we did a lot because the activities were not good).
Ship tip
If you have children, find another ship. The only fun thing for the kids was the Waterworks waterslides.
The disembarkation line was extremely long and wound all through the 7th floor. Too many floors/tag numbers were called at the same time. The system does not work efficiently.
Wow!! What a waste of a cruise cabin! I honestly don't know how anyone can go on any cruise and hate every moment and count down to the end!? Sorry but sounds like you ruined your vacation all on your own! Who sits in their cabin on electronics??
I've learned with these type of reviews to just ignore it. If the cruise was truly that bad they would have bothered to fill out the entire cruise information & posted pictures of everything bad. I'm not sure why the app still allows reviews from unverified cruisers.
Been on the Paradise twice, and both times were nothing less than exceptional.
First off, you booked the Your Time Dining, which is like arriving at a popular restaurant, which means you will wait. You should have booked traditional early of late sitting. That way there would be no wait, you arrive at the assigned time, sit at the same table, same waiter etc. As for the food, your pallet must be very boring, because every meal we had was excellent whether in the MDR, buffet or the specialty places like Guys or the Blue Iguana
Activities: We always found things to do on the ship and plenty of shade on the upper deck area. Not sure what you were expecting, but rather than sit in your room and played with an iPad, you could have done that on deck as well but with an ocean view and a wonderful sea breeze. as fr the children's program, your son sounds very anti-social and no matter what the staff did he would not have liked it, but then again I can see where he gets that from.
As for your cabin, the cabin steward told us, along with the signage in the room, that the linens would only be changed if you left them on the floor. all hotels are also doing this now to save water and soaps from polluting the oceans, Read up on it.
As for the ports of call, you obviously didn't research the excursions available or just try and enjoy anything about them. You gave 3 stars to Cozumel but no comments. What was so bad about Grand Cayman? Been to both ports before and my opinion would have been 3-5 stars for Grand Cayman and 1-3 stars for Cozumel.
The Paradise is an older ship and one of Carnival's smaller ships. Sorry there wasn't enough visual and manufactured activities for you to do on the ship. But to say there was nothing for you to do is wrong. There is plenty to do, you just didn't bother to seek it out or participate in it. If you want a theme park experience, visit Six Flags, Universal or Disney. Your family must be a blast to be around at parties. In addition heed the advice of the others and just stay home.
I'm gonna call BS on this review. Sounds like someone needs to pull the stick out their butt... No way could this happen. The only way a person can have a bad experience on everything an a cruise is because that person has a bad attitude on life.
Cruises aren't for everyone. It's to bad you didn't do your homework before getting on the ship. There are so many excursion for each port where you can see how others live.
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